A Film Company Really Wants To Search Through a Landfill For a Cache Of Terrible E.T. Atari Games

Ah, New Mexico. It’s where the aliens land – including Thor – and apparently where Atari cartridges go to die. The existence of a landfill overflowing with thousands of the cartridges somewhere in the New Mexico desert is a myth in the gaming community. Or is it? The dump is said to contain copies of the embarrassing flop that was E.T. The Extraterrestrial Atari game. It was a monumental failure. Atari paid Steven Spielberg buckets of money for the license and since the game didn’t succeed, they fell deep into debt.

So, they supposedly dumped them. The Alamogordo News has dug into local lore to see if they can determine the truth. The world may know soon enough though because the city commission has given permission to Fuel Industries – a film company – to dig up the old landfill. They can access the area for six months. My guess is they want to make a documentary of some kind. I can’t wait to see whether they find anything!

Then again, if you’ve ever played this game, you might want the horror to stay buried forever.